This paper has two primary objectives. The first is to represent the practicability of making the design of entire buildings a conscious, craftsman-like, activity conducted in the clear, without the mystery that tends, because of designers' usual 'black box' methods, to surround it. To this end, a design strategy and some tactics for resolving decisions at critical stages in the design process, which the authors have described elsewhere, are recapitulated to show how total design of buildings can be pursued in a generic manner. This done, the way is opened for the second objective: to make the large and important field of work that is building design amenable to computerization. The form that pursuit of this second objective is taking is being influenced greatly by growing interest in expert systems, which for everyday professional building design appears a more useful development than previous CAD emphases on drafting and graphics. Application of the authors' design methods to a series of expert systems for the total design of entire buildings is therefore indicated. For such a vast project--the formulation of bases for design assistance and expert systems that can be integrated and used as a generic method for the total design of entire buildings, so that the results are more certain and successful than the outcome of the generality of present-day building design--the most that can be attempted within the limits of a single paper is a set of examples of some of the stages in the process. Nevertheless, since the design method described begins at the 'large end' of the process, where the most consequential decisions are made, it is hoped that the major thrusts and the essential CAD activities will be evident. All design is substantially iterative, and provided that the major iterations are intelligible, there should be no need for this demonstration to labor over the lesser ones